Today I’m sharing my new favourite restaurant in Jakarta. It’s a very good soba place called Abura Soba Yamatoten, famous for its delicious oily soba. Most people don’t know they have a cold soba on the menu, and today I’m trying it.
The restaurant is located at Grand Indonesia Shopping Town East Mall next to Ranch Market at Lower Ground floor. The place is simple and not overly decorated for comfort to aim for a high turnover, and they did it. People generally come to fill their stomach and then leave. It was my second time there and the place was still very busy. It had been open only a few months so the crowd was still high. We put a name down to the queue and took off to look around at UNIQLO nearby. 20-30 minutes later we were seated inside Abura Soba.
We ordered these:
1. [New on Menu!] Creamy abura soba – okay that’s not how it’s written on the menu but it’s how I remembered it because when asked to explain how did it taste, the waitress simply replied it’s creamy.
Let’s see, it has chopped spring onions, dried seaweed and sesame seeds, and the pink stuff is some kind of fish roe which has a strong seafood smell. Don’t add vinegar and chilli oil for this dish. It certainly turned very creamy upon mixing. It has a gentle palate like wafu spaghetti (Japanese style spaghetti) and reminded me of carbonara spaghetti with a twist of seafood.
2. Jya-jya abura soba
A standard abura soba with sweet minced pork, chopped spring onions, dried seaweed, and sesame seeds. Before eating, mix in 2 rounds of vinegar and 2 rounds of chilli oil and stir while hot. If you are not confident in doing that you can always ask the waitress to do it for you professionally. Now don’t be intimidated by the sound of vinegar or chilli oil, I promise you they will make your dish tastes absolutely amazing. Oh, and the chilli oil doesn’t make your dish spicy. I suppose it adds some moisture to the soba, gives it a smooth texture, and makes it easy to eat since there’s no soup. I fall in love with this soba since the first bite and it stays good til the bowl is empty. Here is a picture. Excuse me, it’s like half finished already because it’s too good I forgot to take a photo.
On my first visit I tried their original abura soba. It’s also really tasty with small chunks of roast pork.
3. Ume wasabi abura soba
This one is cold soba, the one and only in the menu and required extra time to serve. The soba comes with plum paste, wasabi paste, chopped spring onions, dried seaweed, sesame seeds, chopped tomatos, steamed veggies, fried crackers, and roast chicken chunks. It’s soba in salad style, fresh and invigorating, oozing with delightful tanginess from the plum paste and wasabi. Served cold, the soba changed to a joyful, chewier texture that glided more smoothly on the tongue. I adore the unexpected combination which took me for a taste adventure and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
That’s it for my soba experience. Now you know why it’s my new favourite place 😉 Are you hungry yet? I definitely want a bowl of soba now. Ciao, ’til next time!
x
Abura Soba Yamatoten
Address: Grand Indonesia Mall, Lantai Ground, East Mall, Jl. MH Thamrin, Thamrin, Jakarta
Phone: 021 23580807
Opening hours: 11 AM – 3.30 PM, 5.30 PM – 10PM
Day Dream Kingdom 
Looks delish. 😊
LikeLike
Yes, it was delicious!
LikeLike